Archive for » January 28th, 2012«

Jan

Thanks to Klout Perks, I had a better excuse for not cooking on a Friday night than “Not tonight, honey, I’ve got a headache.”

With a $15 gift card from Klout Perks, to try Chili’s new “Lighter Choices,” it was a great excuse. (Add to that the free chips and salsa you can get, just for checking in on Foursquare, and it was one of those “offers you can’t refuse.

We also ordered cheese fries – I tasted a few, and they were good, served sizzling hot in a cute little cast-iron skillet.

Just scan a QR code on the menu to get all of the nutrition information instantly, if you have a smartphone.

You can see that the Healthy Dining selection isn’t shabby – nothing boring about Chili’s new Sweet & Spicy Chicken (shown above) – yes, that was my dinner, and it was even more flavorful than you might expect of a 670 calorie restaurant meal. Everyone who knows me knows how much I like hot peppers – so if you say "habanero,” I’d better at least taste it or I’m going to make fun of you for even mentioning it.

NOT that it burned my lips off, by any means, but the chicken had a nice, tangy heat to it. It might be too much for those who like everything on the mild side, but if you enjoy something a little more flavorful than biscuits and gravy, you’d probably enjoy this entrée just fine. The meat itself was tender, though not especially juicy or flavorful in its own right. It had a slightly springy texture to it, most likely from being frozen or processed. I’m not sure that I’d have enjoyed it much, without the additional flavoring of the spicy, citrusy glaze.

Side dishes included rice and steamed broccoli. The broccoli was very lightly steamed and a bit too well-dusted in salt and pepper – I like it that way, but if I were watching my sodium intake, it would not have been a plus. The rice was fine, but even with a confetti sprinkling of corn and colorful sweet peppers, it was quite bland. I left it, and relieved my son of his steamed broccoli, since it would otherwise have gone to waste. His was just a bit overcooked, so I’m not sure if they intentionally give it a lighter steaming on the Lighter Choices dishes, or they were just in a rush back in the kitchen. I prefer it barely steamed – just enough to bring out that lovely, bright green color and make it slightly tender and moist – but can add my own salt and pepper at the table.

My husband and son had steak and ribs. My son’s getting a bit spoiled; he likes Omaha steaks and dinners at Fogo de Chao. He orders his meat medium rare, and expects to get it with a “warm, pink center.” He wasn’t disappointed here, and ranked it highly on the “would you order it again?” scale. Yes, he would. I didn’t steal a taste, but it looked wonderful. The ribs on my husband’s plate looked tender enough to fall off the bone, and he enjoyed his dinner, as well.

Service was prompt and attentive, despite its being a busy Friday night. The gift card turned out to be a nice way to entice us back to Chili’s – it’s been a while. I’m sure it won’t be that long until our next visit!

About the Author

Holly Jahangiri is a professional writer with over twenty years’ experience in technical writing, freelancing, fiction, poetry, and editing. Writer, wife, and mother, Holly is the creator of Trockle and the instigator of the Puppy-Guppy Rebellion.

Category: product review Tags: chili's, chili's lighter choices, healthy dining, nutrition 25 Comments

Jan

It’s All About Perspective – or Is it?

Jeevan Jacob John

Perspective, as I understand it, is the way we look at everything – from our lives to all the little things that we cherish and hate. We can have either a positive – optimistic – perspective, or a negative – pessimistic – perspective about how things are going to happen.

All of us have different perspectives. Our lives depend on it. For instance: if you think your life is interesting, then your life will be interesting. Or, if you think your life is boring, then it will be boring.

Expectations are our predictions for what will happen in the future, and they are influenced by our perspectives. If you expect the future to be exciting and good, then it will be.

Our perspectives and expectations determine what we do and how we do it. For instance: if you have a positive perspective, then you will not give up on a failure (because you expect to reach success eventually). Let me give you an example from my high school experience: I used to score very well on exams that I expected to do well on. My expectations were positive because I studied or I listened and took notes. If you have good expectations for how you are going to do, it will really help you to improve your performance.

Perspectives

As humans, we tend to become fixated on a certain perspective, when looking at a topic. Changing your perspective or view point (when looking at an issue) is not hard. You just have to try to do it.

You need to be able to change your perspective. For example: If you are a writer, you need to be able to look at an issue from various viewpoints and be able to write on all of them. Are you a blogger? If you are, here is a question for you: Have you tried posting from a side that you disagree with it? For instance: Now, among bloggers, there is a lot of debate going around about the length of posts. If you are a supporter of writing long posts, then try supporting the other side – writing short posts. Think like a person whose perspective is opposite to yours. Being able to look at things from different perspectives also helps you to choose the better side of an argument – and write more persuasive arguments for you own side.

If you hate your job, think about why you hate it. Is it the hours? Is because you get paid less than others? Is it because you hate your boss? Before you get sad or angry about it, just realize that there are at least 100 people in this world who have worse problems. There are worse bosses around the world than yours (be thankful that you didn’t get one of those). If you are unhappy about your salary, then think about a 100 million people around the world who work just as hard as you but get a lot lower salary. Think about it.

What do you hate? Why do you hate it? Try to look it from another perspective. Then, it will be easier for you to dislike it less; maybe you will even find reasons to like it! When I started out with blogging, I really hated spending so much time on marketing or networking (spending time on social media), as there are so many ways to do it. The reasons were simple: I didn’t have much time back then; I didn’t have enough motivation to do it; and I thought it was really a waste of time. But, as time progressed, I realized the importance of marketing one’s own content and networking with people. And I started to work on it. I changed my perspective on both of these activities. And I used a couple of tricks to do it:

Dagaloo, a twitter-powered Social Media Game, helped me to increase my motivation to engage with others (basically, to score in this game, you need to network with others).
I used social media metrics to motivate me to take action and improve it (although I didn’t want to worry over it because worrying over it will cause more trouble than good).

Do you have a positive outlook?

It is important to have a positive outlook on life. Back when I was blogging with my old blog, I didn’t really have a positive outlook for my blog. I did have great expectations. But, I didn’t reach those expectations since I didn’t blog consistently. That’s also the reason why I started a new blog (And I do have a positive outlook; I have taught myself not to worry over traffic number or subscriber count. I realized that worrying over your traffic numbers will do more harm than good to you. Yes, do think about it. And take action over it. Worrying actually demotivates you a bit and may even take up a lot of your time). Right now, I am happy with what I have. And you should be too. And strive harder to achieve your goal (both of these sound contradictory, but they are really not). You need to be happy with what you have and strive at the same time to get to your goal.

The Key

The Key is to be patient. Try to be versatile in your perspective. Have a positive outlook in life! Be optimistic. If you try harder, you can accomplish it. Also keep high expectations with what you can do! Thanks for listening!

About the Author Jeevan Jacob John

Jeevan Jacob John is a young blogger who blogs about networking, marketing, social media and traffic generation. He tries to come up with new analogies and perspectives to make it easier for others to understand and apply. Find him at his blog - Blog Networking 101.